I want to bring attention to the summer 2008 MLA Newsletter--hot off the press at this very moment. Gerald Graff's presidential column, "Bringing Writing in from the Cold," articulates the need for the university community to embrace, or re-embrace, the teaching of first-year writing.

I recently finished reading _All the President's Men_ for my comps. It's a fun book in a lot of ways, but I also think it could come in handy for a writing class. As Woodward and Bernstein investigate the Watergate break-in, they get numerous sources to confirm or deny stories and facts, or even provide new information. Still, some sources refuse to go on record or only provide information on background. What I found really fascinating was the newsroom scenes after talking to sources.

The thoughts below meander a bit. They're mostly aimed at those who teach First-year Composition, but may be useful to instructors in other disciplines. I was inspired to cast this bit of prose out into the blogosphere by the realization that the writers I saw in class were not the writers who were composing many of the papers I was reading. No, I'm not talking about plagiarism. What I mean is that I have come to see something of a split consciousness apparent in many of my students' approaches to writing.

I had a conversation with Jack Payne the other day about the importance of research in professional writing . That conversation got me to thinking about the importance of thorough, fact-based research to good writing. I wondered whether most writers - particularly journalistic writers - really know how to adequately research a subject on which they endeavor to write.

By Eric Bryant, Presidenta
Gnosis Arts, A Multi-Service Arts Company
http://www.gnosisarts.com

Does Philosophy Pay?

Answer: Absolutely!

I am a graduate of the UT school of philosophy, class of '98, and I'm actually using my degree in my professional and entrepreneurial pursuits. (Despite the fact that it took me 10 years of meandering around in the taverns pondering the meaning of life over cold pints...but who cares, as long as you get there, right?!)